The Wonderful World of Carminelitta

Newness for your ears: The Lost Tape, Arthur Hamidi

Mar 20

CarminelittaEP, Musical architects, Newness for your ears Arthur Hamidi, Spinnerty, The Lost Tape, Zirafa No Comments

I love music, I guess you all know that by now, but I also love stories. And when some good music has a very interesting story, it makes it all the more appealing to my ears. I told you about Spinnerty a few weeks back (in case you missed it, here’s the spotlight) and I am now very grateful to Replife for making the connection, as the San-Francisco-based producer and DJ has more than one trick up his sleeve! I already told you in my previous post how versatile he was, blending a wide range of genres and influences. But what he put me on recently sounds so amazing to me I had to share it. To make the story clearer to you, I will do something I rarely do, that is I will simply copy the presentation of the tape, because I think it is quite incredible. It goes like this…

About 2 years ago I was on my way to San Francisco on I-80 when I found a broken cassette at a gas station near SLC. It had spooled out all over the place and was in bad shape, and the only thing it said on it was “6/12/76 demos” scrawled on one side and “arthur hamidi 82601 fr zo” on the other side. I was intrigued so when I got to San Francisco Dan helped me spool back the tape back into its original casing. We managed to get the thing working and got through about four tracks before his tape player ate the damn thing completely. Those four tracks that we did get to hear were…incredible. Forward thinking and fresh sounding, but gritty all the same. We tried looking up Arthur Hamidi but couldn’t find any information about him. Dan and I immediately went to work trying to recreate those four tracks as best we could by ear, before we let the memory of the songs and sounds fade away.

What you hear now is our interpretation of those four songs we heard that day. While we used modern equipment to recreate these sounds, we’re guessing the real Arthur Hamidi probably did it with tape loops and analog synths. Maybe he didn’t think anybody would want to hear his music or maybe he just disappeared, but if anybody has any information about Arthur Hamidi please contact us. Family, friends, fans, anybody…thanks.

And if you are out there Arthur Hamidi, we’ll hold your name for you until you get back.

Until then.
Zirafa & Spinnerty

Now, I guess most of you will agree with me about the fact that this is quite an awesome story. It reminds me slightly of Saul Williams’ The Dead Emcee Scrolls and I find it quite incredible that some artists can find such treasures and share them with the world while adding their own interpretation and ‘touch’. This Lost Tape sounds like a trip to another dimension, it makes me travel back into the past via the future and definitely makes me disconnect for reality completely, with its electronic vibes and hypnotic melodies. It is not really the kind of music I listen to on a regular basis but it is a much welcome opening up of my ears and mind. I am very happy that Zirafa and Spinnerty decided to pay tribute to Arthur Hamidi, whoever he is/was and allowed people to discover this anonymous genius.

Now that you are curious enough about this mysterious Lost Tape, you can head to the website for the original and the remixes or simply click on the link below. Enjoy the journey and spread the word!